Perfect harmony of flowers and vegetables for Piccolo Farm
The owners of a NSW farm which grows about 40 different edible flowers and 70 vegetables were hit hard by the effects of COVID-19, but have found a silver lining in the pandemic.
WHEN Piccolo Farm had a polytunnel blow away in a storm, a call out on social media drew an astonishing response.
“Within 10 days we had $13,000 donated to us through crowd-funding to buy a new polytunnel,” explained Lizzie Buscaino, who runs Piccolo Farm with her husband Gianluigi and two children.
“It was a mind-blowing response, especially given there were no rewards offered, just a plea for help. A lot of people were interested in seeing us continue as a farm. We have a tightly connected community, which was one of the reasons we became farmers in the first place.”
This community response underscores the success of Piccolo Farm, a 1ha property in NSW’s Thirlmere.
The farm grows about 40 different edible flowers and 70 vegetables – including rare and heirloom varieties – for restaurants and household vegetable boxes, this year winning a delicious. award for its purple oxalis.
It was the community that again stepped up when coronavirus hit and the Buscainos lost their restaurant markets.
“Most of our income went in a week, but then within two weeks we doubled our vegie boxes and now have a waiting list,” said Lizzie, admitting that with restaurants now restarting they were having to increase production on the back of a COVID-19 resurgence.
“Because of our size we can be flexible and innovative and we’ve found customers don’t want to go to supermarkets and prefer to buy from us. We pick, pack, and transport all the produce ourselves.”
NEIGHBOURHOOD WATCH
ON the back of this pandemic silver lining, Lizzie said they had again tapped into this community ethos and cast the net wider for other producers.
In May, Lizzie created an app offering products from other farmers in the region, including dairy, apples from an orchard, strawberries and handmade pasta.
“Every week I send a text out to customers that this is what’s in the box and they then jump on the app and add in extras from other producers.
“We could have just gone to the market to add in more product, but we chose to engage with local farmers because we believe in collaboration.”
Lizzie, who worked in hospitality and travel, and Gianluigi, a chef, said when they started Piccolo Farm five years ago their business plan included a focus on supporting and educating people to grow and farm.
As such, throughout the year they run open days and workshops, such as their recent Young Farmers Connect event on August 2, as well as a kids’ garden, taking school groups for gardening classes.
Piccolo Farm is based on the intensive cropping practices of Canadian farmer and educator Jean-Martin Fortier, whose book, The Market Gardener, details how on 1.5 acres he grosses more than $CA100,000/acre with operating margins of about 60 per cent, based on high-quality crops grown efficiently.
Based on Fortier’s growing principles, the Buscainos grow on 60 garden beds 20m long, as well in a block of eight beds 30m long in a poly tunnel.
MIX AND MATCH
THEIR most popular product is their lettuce mix, grown year-ground, which includes specialty varieties such as mezuna, red vein sorrel and snow pea sprouts.
This is followed by tomatoes, of which they grow about seven varieties, including yellow cherry, green zebra and galaxy.
Edible flowers are grown in 40 varieties, with the most popular violas and cornflowers, pre-COVID selling about 80 x 240ml punnets a week to restaurants.
“I love to grow unusual things, not run of the mill, such as Japanese turnips, which have a mild, buttery flavour,” said the 39-year-old.
Seed is sourced from suppliers around Australia who specialise in unusual varieties, such as The Italian Gardener, Seedfreaks in Tasmania and ActiveVista. The couple grow out seeds in a small greenhouse, planting and harvesting year-round to organic principles, although they are not certified.
Because they have heavy clay soil, they prepare beds using compost, chicken manure and blood and bone.
Crops are rotated, using a green cover crop in between sowing such as peas, oats, vetch or plants from the mustard family, to add nitrogen to the soil. Soil is regularly tested with fertigation – through drip line irrigators – providing nutrient needs, using Seasol and Beneficial Anaerobic Microbes.
NET RETURNS
TO avoid pests, especially cabbage moth and Rutherglen bugs, fine netting is used across the farm.
Companion planting has also proved successful, especially fennel hedges.
“I preach about this all the time,” Lizzie said, “as the hedge is a haven for hoverfly, lady beetles and predatory microwasps.”
In addition, they buy in beneficial bugs as predators against the likes of spider mite.
Each Wednesday the couple harvest, pack boxes (each $45 box containing up to 12 veg), before delivering wholesale and retail on Thursdays across the Southern Highlands and to the greater Sydney area.
Lizzie, who grew up in Sweden and came to Australia in 2003, said she and Gianluigi, who grew up in Australia, both opted to farm full time after first being part of a community garden in inner Sydney.
“It’s the best thing we have ever done, a very fulfilling job, just having a chef say how well our turnips were received or a customer saying they made an amazing spinach lasagne.”
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